Free Missing From Home by Mary Burchell Page B

further interest, just say so and I’ll go away without giving you your sister’s message.”
    “ Message? You’ve got a message from Pat?” Marilyn’s whole attitude changed. “Oh, no—please don’t be offended. I’m sorry if I was curt, but we’re all a bit on edge, you know. Come in, anyway—” She began to fumble for her key, but the young man stopped her.
    “Don’t you know you should never invite strange men in when you’re on your own?” he said severely. “I might be any sort of crook, for all you know.”
    “Oh, rubbish,” retorted Marilyn lightly. “You’ve been reading too many thrillers.”
    “I begin to think I’m living one, from the ridiculous and mysterious way you and your sister are going on,” he replied crossly. “But anyway, I don’t want to come in. I promised Pat I would see you alone, and she seemed certain her parents would be out this morning — following some preposterous false clue, if I’m not mistaken.” He looked severely at Marilyn, who withstood the glance with admirable coolness.
    “Can we go somewhere and talk?” he asked, with a return to his rather stiff manner. “In case they came in, I mean.”
    “Can’t you just give me her message and leave it at that?”
    “No, I can’t.” Suddenly he looked extraordinarily obstinate. “I’m not prepared to go on following instructions meekly and blindly. I agreed to deliver your sister’s message, since she made such a point of it. But I intend to ask some questions of my own in return.”
    Marilyn eyed him without favour at that. But she could not afford to make terms of her own at the moment. She needed too badly to know Pat’s message. So a little ungraciously she said,
    “Come on, then. We’ll go and have some coffee at a place round the corner . Even if Mother and Dad come home, they won’t look for me there.”
    In silence they retraced their steps to the lift, descended to the ground floor and walked the short distance to the coffee-shop. It was as though neither was prepared to accept the disadvantage of speaking first. And only when they were seated at the back of the dim coffee lounge did Marilyn say briskly, “Well, now tell me Pat’s message. And first of all, how did she get it to you ? ”
    “She telephoned me at my office. I think I must have mentioned the firm I work for when she and I talked together on the cross-Channel boat. She told me her father was an artist, and I explained that I too was an artist of sorts. Commercial art with Morgan and Petersfield. She evidently remembered the name.” He seemed pleased that at least Pat had remembered this much about him. But Marilyn urged him on to the real point.
    “Go on. When did she telephone?”
    “Hardly more than an hour ago, I’d say. She was evidently a good deal distressed and she said—” his manner softened perceptibly—“that I was the only person to whom she could turn.”
    Marilyn, who knew how wonderfully well Pat could conduct this sort of conversation, nodded understandingly.
    “She said she was going to be unable to keep an appointment with you.” He stopped and stared hard at the girl opposite. “Is that correct? Was there an appointment between you two ? ”
    “If she said so, it isn’t for me to deny it,” replied Marilyn, who thought that was pretty diplomatic. “I’m asking you a question,” he said angrily.
    “And I’m not answering anything until I hear the whole message,” retorted Marilyn.
    They glared at each other in a hostile manner, as though each were trying to decide who held the better cards. Then he seemed to remember that his principle business was to deliver the message, for he went on rather sulkily,
    “She said—and she made me repeat the words, to make sure I got them right—that I was to tell you she would leave a message with the garage man; that you would understand what this meant when you got there.”
    “Clever old Pat!” exclaimed Marilyn in immense relief, before she